Furniture Refinisher
I have a chest of drawers that I would like to refinish; any recs Thanks
terryhoppy
in General Discussion 5 years and 9 months ago
11
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11 replies
hkapstein | 5 years and 8 months ago
I’d use stainless or bronze wool to limit the risk of rust forming in the finish if it gets wet.
stevecym | 5 years and 8 months ago
what bob is saying, about 0000 steel, one of the my old shop teachers (and yes, he is now old) once told me that he put a clear finish on furniture and then rubbed it with wax and steel wool. that guy was and is a professional furniture maker ( i am not). so maybe what bob is saying is the professional way and what i am saying is just a way around a problem?
RobertGMarvin
in General Discussion 5 years and 8 months ago
As always Steve suggests a real professional solution to improve the overly glossy poly finish on the OP’s piece. As an experienced, but fairly lazy long-term “brownstoner”, with minimal woodworking skills, I can suggest an easier method that, to my non-purist eyes, is nearly as good. Simply go over the furniture lightly with 0000 steel wool and then wax it. IMO Briwax is especially good, but any quality paste wax will be fine.
It really IS a shame (IMO) to use polyurathane on a piece of stripped oak furniture. A finish that I especially like on oak is Minwax Antique Oil Finish. I know that professionals like Steve dislike Minwax products, but iAntique Oil has worked well for me. It was the latest high-tech wonder when I first refinished furniture a half century ago. It’s unpopular now and hard to find (perhaps because it’s (I think) banned in California, but some hardware stores carry it and Amazon sells it
stevecym | 5 years and 8 months ago
@brokelin: if you have a real antique, then yes, wax or wax over an oil that was allowed to dry (we are doing it here on my stair balustrade and are still not done; it is time consuming). but they also used shellac, at least in the US from about 1840 to 1940 and that is not the best finish either; its limited in appearance and will wear.
the finish and the process are things that should have been discussed during the first conversation and should have been written down; the onus was on the contractor but the consumer should be aware that a conversation about finish has to take place.
if you still have this piece, you can still sand this down, carefully, with 180, perhaps 150, and then 180 or 220 or even 320 and then tack it and wax it. a real pro might wet sand it to 400. if the finish is real heavy, you can go heavier on the sand paper but if you sand with a lower number, you risk: 1. going through the finish and into the stain and wood and 2. leaving sanding marks. the trick is to not go through the original poly finish and into the stain and to sand over the heavier paper to remove sanding marks left in the poly. maybe multiple passes with 180 and then a couple with 220. if you use heavier paper, tack between courses to remove any stray grit.
when we run into situations where someone wants wax but needs durability (we have waxed interior doors) we have used water base poly underneath and then waxed over it. keep in mind, wax is used on auto finish; it will adhere. if you did what i just suggested, you will end up with something very durable and will be able to repair the wax finish if it becomes damaged.
i have the name of someone i have listed here before who might be able to hand sand this out to take the finish down a bit and wax it. let me know if you want his name.
hkapstein | 5 years and 8 months ago
What type of finish did you want @brokelin? Shellac? Phenolic? Wax? A better looking polyurethane?
brokelin | 5 years and 8 months ago
And I mean thick, shiny coats of polyurethane, as I’ve never seen before or since on any antique furniture. He had totally stripped the wood, put on a really nice stain, and then ruined the look completely. And charged me way more that even a really good job was worth – you don’t necessarily get what you pay for.
brokelin | 5 years and 8 months ago
Word of advice – be very specific about what type of finish you want if you hire somebody to do it for you. I once took an old oak dining table and buffet to a good refinisher who owned an antique store on Atlantic Ave. When I got it back, it was coated with poly. When I asked why he would do that to nice old furniture, he said dining tables didn’t stand up with children using them. As someone with no children, which he knew, I thought this was very odd. It did not occur to me that he would poly nice old furniture, as none of the stuff in his store had poly on it.
hkapstein | 5 years and 8 months ago
Stripping is a lot of labor, and building up a new finish is also time consuming, so unless the piece is very valuable to you, it’s often not economical. If you have downtime you could do it yourself. I would say it’s kind of relaxing work if you’re not doing it every day for a living. Have a beer and work on it for a few hours every weekend. If you stripped it yourself, you could probably get it finished for not too much, and that’s where I think a pro could really help. There’s a lot to consider in selecting and applying a finish. Type of wood, whether to stain, type of stain, type of varnish, wash coats, seal coats, number of coats, glazing, toning, etc. Wipe, brush or spray, do you want to rub out. There’s a lot that can go wrong and bring you back to the stripping phase if you don’t get it right. On the other hand, there’s no guarantee a pro won’t do a bad job finishing, so I’d ask questions about the products and the process. Also, materials are generally pretty cheap for this type of project compared to labor, so I would want to make sure a good quality varnish g ot applied. Mostly they are the same quality, but who knows what someone has at the back of his shop, or how long it was sitting there.
stevecym | 5 years and 8 months ago
and look at what bob says. i fix finishes all the time. not always perfect but it can be done with varying results. you can consider the product that bob mentions but you also have to know what is on there to use something compatible (shellac is easy to fix). sometimes if you do not know, what will work over something. wax will adhere to raw wood, shellac, poly, lacquer, anything and it is the softer finish, so from a technical standpoint, it is acceptable to use over other finishes.
stevecym | 5 years and 8 months ago
dean@westripwood.com. they are on long island but work in the city. they have the website east end wood strippers and perhaps park slope furniture refinishing. i could do it but i am busy.
RobertGMarvin
in General Discussion 5 years and 9 months ago
Before stripping, or other heavy-duty refinishing you might want to try using something like Howard’s Reatore-a-Finish in an appropriate color